Letters from Elder Travis Neuberger called to serve as a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Nadaam. My 1st, Their 91st

Saikhan Naadsan uu? Bi ch gesen

Opening ceremonies for Nadaam

So the week started off with a bang as we attended a family home evening put
on by President Clark's family and some others on Monday night. They were
all in town for Nadaam and played instruments and sang. Also a local
church member came and played the horse head fiddle which was gorgeous. Unfortunately,
the video I took is way too long to
send. All of the missionaries went as well as all the church members from my
first area, so I was able to see a lot of friends again.

Tuesday brought district meeting and Elder Robbins’ English teaching. Although
we didn’t teach his student, I was able to talk to his brother about the
economy, elections, some crazy dream he had, and speeding tickets in America
for an hour and a half. (heads up everyone - that was all in Mongolian
haha). That night we began checking addresses and found some great
members before they headed to the countryside with the entire city for Nadaam.

The wrestling event

Wednesday began Nadaam which pretty much puts everything on hold for the
next three days. The city just shuts down, mostly cause everyone leaves for the
countryside. Nadaam is pretty much like the Olympics for Mongolians and
another big holiday mixed together. It’s three days of wrestling, horse
racing, and archery. It all gets started with a giant opening ceremony at
the stadium. Elder Robbins and I got invited by his sponsor to attend it
(score one for English teaching). So we woke up and then headed down to
the stadium at 11. It was about two hours of dancing, singing, and culture.
The president of Mongolia came and opened the games. The whole
thing was spectacular and we even watched some wrestling for a while.

After the opening we walked through the city of tents that were selling
khuushuur. While buuz is the food of Tsagan Sar, khuushuur dominates
Nadaam. We ate our fill and started heading back into the main city
when we ran into a group of other missionaries. We spent the next couple
of hours with them and went to the main square in the middle of the city.
When that was over Elders Quinton, Boyd, Williams, Woodward and our
companionship decided it was time to make our own khuushuur so we did varying
the traditional recipe of mutton and onions to chicken and hot wing sauce. Great khuushuur!

The next day was a planned trip for all the missionaries who are in the
city. We took a two hour bus outside the city with the senior
couplesto a kind of campsite. It
was right next to a river, with a giant field and mountains surrounding it.
In summary, gorgeous! Unfortunately my camera was dead so I'm
working on getting the pictures from other missionaries on that. We spent
an hour playing soccer and then Elder Boyd and I converted that to some
ultimate Frisbee which took some explaining to the Mongolians ("No, you
don’t throw it like a baseball"), but it turned out great. We also
ate kharkhug which is a whole sheep boiled in a giant 30 gallon drum over a
fire with carrots and vegetables to taste. And what would a Mongolian
holiday be without a little mare’s milk…not gonna say it's my favorite.
Sidenote: the senior couple the Farmers from St Louis came this week and
he was wearing a Cardinals’ shirt . . . Cardinal nation still
exists!

After all that it was back to the "white wash" of the new area.
Since Friday was also Nadaam we struggled to find people actually at
home, but by the end of the day we were able to find a less active man who
lives with his family as the only member of the church. He was ecstatic
to see us and spent time showing us all his pictures and sharing his testimony
with us. It was neat just to be able to give someone the attention they
deserve as a child of God. That’s how it’s been this week. We’ve
walked into almost every house not knowing at all what to expect and have come
out with smiles almost every time.

Saturday night I called everyone on all of our new member, less active, and
investigator boards in the newest invented missionary game “Saturday night sumd
yvakh showdown." The white wash will surely take you out of
your comfort zone that’s for sure. It’s way hard and way exciting at the
same time. On Sunday we were lucky to have an RM show us some houses and
teach us the area.

It’s been a great week!

Elder Neuberger

The MTC group. Final P-day event before the departures of Elder Neaf and Elder Call